Audio

I’m off to Senegal to shoot a short documentary on the volunteer work of my friend Dr. Al Ruenes. Al is a urologist who regularly visits Senegal to teach new techniques to surgeons from all over Africa, and while he’s there, does a whole slew of pro bono procedures for Senegalese patients.

Also coming is renowned plein air artist Bob Beck. He’s going to make paintings of the trip, I’m going to make the short video, and when we get back, we’re going to try to use this stuff to raise money for an operating theater Al hopes to fund in Dakar.

Originally, my son Brian was coming along to do the video duties, and I was just doing stills and audio. But then, young Brian had to go and get a great new gig as an associate producer for a new series at Discovery Channel and couldn’t get the time off.

(Oh sure, let a little thing like a major career move get in the way of a trip with the old man….sheesh, these kids!)

So it’s up to me to do my one-man band routine.

I’m only mildly panicked, as I’ve spent a lot of the summer studying up, shooting a lot of video to try to get my chops somewhat up to snuff.  Even at that, I’ve got a long way to go as a videographer, but I’m ready as I’ll ever be by tonight, anyway!

And just like in my still shooting,  I’ve been researching and finding the smallest, most reasonably-priced stuff that will do the job right.

So it’s going to be a little quiet on the blog for the rest of the month. And comment moderation could be very slow, so if you post a comment and it doesn’t show up for a while, it is nothing more nefarious than a bad or non-existent internet connection in my location!

For a look at the gear I’ll be bringing on this one man band gig, hit the jump. (more…)